Four cycles into 4th year and I finally feel like boring a rusty ogre through my skull. It’s not that the clinicals are bad, it’s just the Neurology. Now, while I don’t know what torture methods the Russians used during wars and the like, I’m guessing that 4 lectures in a day with an 15 minute break between lectures was definitely on the list.

To make matters worse, there’s zero eye-candy and a really, really ancient relic of a teacher talking about the neural pathways of vision. I wonder whether she had seen or noticed the paltry 20 something students in the lecture hall, many of them paying more attention to their phones than to her.

Back to the eye-candy thing. I’ll admit, that is pretty much all I want to talk about. I genuinely began with Neurology in mind, but me writing about classes and my education is about as likely as my dog, Wishbone pulling a Lassie. So I figured I might as well write about what I know best: pointless, embarassing school crushes.

My current useless distraction from all that is sucky in the world just further proves that the part of my brain that decides on what I’m attracted to should be surgically removed. ADD moment, here’s an example of what I find appealing: fattening Italian food, the smell of Dettol, mild turbulence on a flight…oh, did I mention unattainable men?!! Well, unattainable boy in Seungri’s case.

The current optical lollipop is a younger than me, married with a child, possibly canine-consuming, non English speaking, Vietnamese dude. I’ve aptly dubbed him “Baby Owner”. He has an adorable baby and a sweet wife, which makes me feel unbelievably guilty for checking him out in the first place, but believe it or not, that isn’t the damper of this story.

My story is about how without even trying, I can make myself look like a  hopeless case in front of any guy I find remotely comely.

Facultative Therapy lecture. Let me just ask you, what does the average, sane guy normally want in a girl? Someone sweet, gentle, pretty…perhaps even ladylike? My first display of my feminine charm was flipping the finger to a co-groupmate for his attempt at being funny. True to the course of all things twisted, this colourful gesture was made across the hall, in plain sight to anyone who was looking up. By anyone, I of course, mean Baby Owner. Strike One.

Unfortunately for me, the class I had prior to the lecture was far from pleasant, and a potent combination of insufficient sleep, a pending case history and the aforementioned class has turned me into the average post-office clerk on a Monday morning. By the time the lecture had reached its intermission, I was convinced that I deserved weekend inebriation as a reward. Me being me, I declared in a clear, resolute tone, ” I AM GETTING PISS DRUNK THIS WEEKEND. I DON’T CARE. I will get so wasted that I will have to drag myself to bed and pass out.” This was also the day that Baby Owner decided not to be his usual claustrophobic self and had parked himself in the seat next to the English-SPEAKING Vietnamese guy who happened, just HAPPENED to be sitting 2 rows behind me. Strike Two?

After that fabulous display of everything that every etiquette book tells me not to be, I made myself feel better by dismissing it as one of those things that will be forgotten by the next meal. I mean, people have lives, they’re nothing like me; they don’t remember stupid, random hand gestures when they’ve got a baby to burp and a class to study for. With that said, life went on and I resumed to my quiet lecture hall voyeurism.

Sunday night. My “preen and pamper myself whilst cleaning up” day (whenever I remember, anyway). This usually consists of me slapping on some Indian (i.e. Lebuh Ampang) hair oil for my alopecia, tackling the laundry that I normally avoid, and some trash throwing. On this particular night, I was especially generous with the hair oil (my life throughout my 2-week cycle was sustained by instant noodles, biscuits and Nescafe. Go figure) and I proceeded with my chores. I guess now would be a good time to mention that I had so much oil in my hair and it was so well slicked back that Pedro my guinea pig was checking his reflection when I carried him, and even our resident “typical Indian”, Hari Krishnan made fun of my abundant application of oil. I haven’t even gotten to the scent of this oil. Think a million roses jammed into a 100ml bottle of HERBAL hair oil. Still, it was the weekend, and practically everyone on my floor has experienced a whiff of the nasty stuff. Pretty tame situation, right? Heh.

Back to my chores. I walked out my front door to throw rubbish down the chute at the end of the 14th floor hallway, hair gleaming in the glow of the fluorescent lights. And that is when I noticed two figures at the doorway to the chute, talking and holding bottles. As I approached them, I realized that they were speaking in Vietnamese. No worries, I figured it was Tukang Flash*, since he lives on te 15th floor. However, as I got even closer, I noticed the Seungri-esque hair and the piercing eyes. FARK. It was Baby Owner. He who fears all who aren’t his wife and child, was chilling out with a FRIEND, accompanied by an alcoholic beverage on my friggin’ floor, no less. What are the odds?

And there I was, bearing enough oil to attract Texans, emanating the smell of a fertile botanical garden, and to complete the image, a bagful of garbage as my clutch purse.

Just the kind of finale one would expect from me.

* Tukang Flash is a Vietnamese guy in our lecture hall who insists on taking pictures of lecture slides with the flash function switched on. For those who don’t already know, the use of flash photography during lectures and stage performances are generally frowned upon due to its disruptive properties.